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A Brief History of the Animation Age Ghetto
So, one of the most common preconceptions of animation is that it's only for kids. Or, if you get especially lucky with a person who isn't all that versed in the medium it becomes "animation is only for kids, unless it's like South Park." Obviously this isn't true. The only time it may have been true is in the 70's, and that's why I'm bringing this up now. But I suppose you're probably wondering how this came to be. I mean, it's such an odd thing, right? The medium started out generally being for everyone. Anyone could go down to a theater and watch animation, regardless of age. Animators did generally what they wanted and people of all ages enjoyed things like Felix the Cat or Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. I mean occasionally you'd get something more geared towards adults, or something more geared towards children. But it doesn't explain why I need to clarify something like Mary & Max may not be appropriate for some children. This is a movie where a pregnant woman attempts to commit suicide. While this attitude is dying out with shows like Friendship is Magic or Steven Universe, it's still prevalent. This is why you generally don't see animated features nominated for awards outside ones specifically for animation. The mainstream high society view of animation is that it's either for children or childish. I mean, there are other prejudices. Wreck-It Ralph most likely lost to Brave because Wreck-It Ralph is a video game movie. And The Lego Movie wasn't nominated at all because it's based on toys. Preconceptions often determine things like awards. So, let's talk about these preconceptions and where they came from. And more importantly, how we can get them to go away. Also, I must apologize once again for an American-only perspective. I understand that Japan is a lot more complex in this issue, at least, and I don't know about the perception of animation in other countries. Honestly, there's only one thing to blame when it comes to establishing the animation age ghetto: the television. Let's think about it. Let's go back to the 1950's. Theatrical animation before this time was highly profitable and as such, it could be well-done technically, with each new frame completely re-drawn. The limited animation technique I described before was only usually done for stylistic choices. Starting in 1949, people began producing cartoons specifically for television. It was nowhere near as profitable, and to make up your losses, you had to put less money into your craft. Keep in mind that things like animation cel's can be really expensive. Any artist knows that art supplies aren't cheap. The absolute low-point of this trend was Clutch Cargo, where they super-imposed lips over still frames. I hear that it has good and creative stories, but what did RebelTaxi say about 12 Oz Mouse? "It may be the funniest show on Earth, but I don't want to look at it." Sounds about right. Now let's combine this with the fact that one of television's biggest advertisement campaigns that it was a way to keep your kids quiet. It's amazing how times change, isn't it? One reason that I attack this mentality a lot is because kids are usually more willing to watch anything. I might be crazy, but I believe that this should not be encouraged. Kids remember what they watch, and when they look back on it, their impressions do create preconceptions to the rest of the medium. Up until The Simpsons in 1989, the only cartoons aimed at not adults, but families, to last more than 1 season were The Flintstones ''and ''Wait Till Your Father Gets Home. Because the cartoons weren't very good, when the kids grew up they stopped watching the cartoons and had the perception that they were only for kids. Not helping at all was Walt Disney's death in the 60's. It took a long time for the company to recover, and they were the biggest face of theatrical animation. American theatrical animation not by Walt Disney was rare to begin with, and in the 70's, well they weren't just making films that hit average at best, but they were generally producing less and less. The ghetto was established. And then it was made worse. Because it was for kids it had to be heavily regulated. Parents' Groups began lobbying for harsher and harsher rules. You'll learn about this in my rant about the 1975 Tom & Jerry show. Hanna-Barbara's crazy spin-off ideas didn't help matters, but I can't really blame them for this neutered mess. Cartoons were not allowed to be violent. They were not allowed to use the word "Death." They were not allowed to be controversial. They could barely have conflict. So not only did these cartoons have no ambitions to reach beyond a child audience, they weren't allowed to. Meanwhile Ralph Bakshi releases Fritz the Cat. It's a movie that you think would help break this mentality, but this mentality is a weird one. It created the idea of animation "for adults" and its own stereotypes, but the prevailing idea was that if it wasn't like Fritz the Cat then it was painfully dull, lacking conflict, and badly put together and made specifically for kids. It wasn't until the 1980's did at least one of these problems go away. Ronald Reagan deregulated television. This did a lot of things, but namely it allowed cartoons to be one long toy commercial as long as they gave like an educational PSA at the end. And knowing is half the battle. You'd think that this would just be trading one problem for another, but no, this started us on the way out. Now that cartoons could be made to sell toys, they became profitable. Think Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, My Little Pony, or Transformers. But isn't this a thing of the past now? That's actually kind of debatable. Flash animation did reduce the cost needed to create a cartoon and there is digital distribution but when you take a look at something like Friendship is Magic, toy sales can turn a cartoon into a phenomenon. And yes, stupid things have been sacrificed and destroyed on the altar of toy sales. In all honesty, it's a tool to be used well or used poorly like any other. The secret is using the toys to keep the show alive rather than the other way around. Then what happened? Well, then I guess the best way to put it is the artists stepped in. Art and business have an interesting relationship. As much as they tend to go against each other, they do need each other. Business can spread art further and art can spread business further. The toy-based cartoons of the 80's were founded on business. And this proved to Disney, a business, that television animation could be profitable. Disney produced their first cartoon for syndication in 1987. This means that it could be broadcast on multiple channels, so other channels could buy the broadcasting rights to show this cartoon. This would not have happened a decade prior. DuckTales wasn't just profitable, it was GOOD. Like, it still holds up today, and many of the cartoons to follow. Disney was focused on dominating this area with the best product they could muster. And yes, it predates even Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988), which sparked the Disney theatrical Renaissance. When someone is doing good in a business, other businesses will step in and try to fight over the success themselves. As much as the 90's Nostalgia blind do annoy me, it was a very progressive and important time for animation. Namely, this is when we got the Simpsons. The Simpsons is a monster, and it wasn't for kids. Quite honestly it might have been as "edgy" as South Park was a decade later. A father straight up strangling his son? The important part is that The Simpsons does use cartoon logic and probably opened a lot of people's eyes to the conventions of the medium and how it could be used in a clever way. Not to mention that both Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon came up around this time. Children's cartoons were still quite censored. They didn't really push the bar. DuckTales was great, but it was largely wholesome. Along comes Ren & Stimpy. The show's creator John K and the network Nickelodeon were constantly at odds because John K was constantly trying to push the bar past tasteful, and the network didn't want that. Other shows of the time, like Dexter's Lab, did get crap past the radar, but nothing compared to Ren & Stimpy. And it was enormously popular. And like I said, when business sees success, they go for success. Derivatives started popping up, almost all of them awful. But the precedent they set was wonderful. Let me explain. With the exception of Nickelodeon, networks were creating shows to "push the bar." In essence, they removed the bar in order to compete with Ren & Stimpy. They now wanted shows that were gross and vulgar and could throw in taboos. And that sounds like it would end in disaster, but it didn't. I'm going to let you in on a little secret: most artists aren't obsessed with vulgarity or traumatizing children. I can tell you right now that Mega Babies came out of a business decision and not an artistic decision, because it doesn't have the grace of Ren & Stimpy. Shows in the coming years may not have taken direct influence from Ren & Stimpy, but many of them can thank the bar being removed. Shows didn't have to vulgar, but they could do what they wanted, shows like the Powerpuff Girls, Batman: The Animated Series. Hell, Rocko's Modern Life is kind of like the cartoons from the 40's in that it wasn't made specifically for children. Anyone could watch it. And yes, the people who grew up on these shows are now able to look back on them. For the most part, I don't think they see the stupid, only-for-kids stuff that the stereotype presents. Cartoons were profitable again, and they were at one of their peaks. Unfortunately, the 2000's decade didn't really help. I'm fairly certain that many people who grew up on 90's cartoons saw the new cartoons of the 2000's decade like Squirrel Boy and My Gym Partner's a Monkey and felt that they had grown out of cartoons, which may be why the preconception didn't die out completely. But then the internet came along. Honestly I think the internet is one of the greatest inventions in history. It's the modern printing press, but that's a different topic. People could create their own animations and let anyone in the world see them. This allows ideas that business wouldn't to flourish. These are ideas like Eddsworld or Dick Figures, ideas that couldn't really be pitched to a network but have managed to succeed beyond network wisdom. People can connect easily, pool their talents, use advanced technology to do whatever they want with the medium, for the sake of it. (And yes, there still is business there. YouTube's business allows their content creators to be artists. Same with Newgrounds). On top of that, there's digital distribution. Not only is that another way to avoid the networks (think of Bojack Horseman as a Netflix exclusive), but it makes any cartoon on Amazon automatically more profitable. It also helps accessibility when anyone can buy whatever episode of whatever show whenever they want and watch it whenever they want. A decade ago we had to use a DVR, and before that, you needed to record it with a VHS. On the internet you can talk to anyone about anything. If there's something you want to talk about, there's a website for it. And at least in some circles, the preconception of animation being only for kids has faded. This has also allowed shows like My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic to explode in popularity. With fast social media, even network executives know that more general audiences are watching shows like Steven Universe or Adventure Time, and the artists definitely know it too. If you've watched either of these shows you know of the complex themes they can deal with. Unfortunately there is still one sphere where the "animation is for kids" preconception still exists--theater. Unless it's an animated movie based on an already existing television show for adults like South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut chances are it's going to be a kids' movie. That doesn't mean it's bad, far from it. What I'm talking about is a film that's made more with children in mind. With this mentality around in theaters, it's unlikely that we'll ever get another Fantasia or another Heaven and Earth Magic or another Fantastic Planet. Do you know how rare even a PG-13 animated film is? The last one released (in the United States) was 9... in 2009. Unfortunately, this is kind of where business and artistry hit an impasse. Business doesn't do anything that hasn't been proven successful, but to get here an artist needs to do something expensive that hasn't been proven successful. My best guess of how we'll get past this stage is crowd-funding. I predict that some independent artist is going to kickstart his own film and get it into theaters. Considering The Babadook, an Australian psychological horror film that was kickstarted, it's not too implausible. It's definitely the most likely way of completely destroying the "animation is only for kids" myth. If my web animations admirable animations are anything to go for, there are some talented people with some really good ideas. One of them is going to make our generation's answer to The Yellow Submarine and create an animated film that's not only immensely successful but pushes the medium is new directions.